William Massey

William Ferguson "Bill" Massey (26 March 1856-10 May 1925) was Prime Minister of New Zealand from 10 July 1912 to 10 May 1925, succeeding Thomas Mackenzie and preceding Francis Bell. He was a member of the Reform Party of New Zealand.

Biography
William Ferguson Massey was born in Limavady, County Londonderry, Ireland in 1856, and he emigrated to New Zealand with his family in 1870 and settled at Tamaki. He leased a farm at Mangere in 1877, became active in the local masonic lodge, and in 1890 became president of the Mangere Famrers' Club. He became president of the Auckland district of the National Association, and in 1893 entered Parliament. He became prominent in parliamentary opposition to Richard Seddon's government, and was a champion of farming interests. He became leader of the conservative opposition in 1903, which in 1909 emerged as the Reform Party of New Zealand. He worked hard at party organization, and created the first disciplined parliamentary party in New Zealand politics. These organizational efforts, his propagation of farming interests through demanding the private purchase of state lands, as well as his graphic warnings about the threats of an advancing New Zealand Labor Party resulted in his narrow victory in the 1911 elections, though Joseph Ward's New Zealand Liberal Party was able to hang on to government until 6 July 1912. Massey's government forcefully suppressed a militant dockers' and coalminers' strike from 1912 to 1913, one of the most bitter industrial disputes in New Zealand history. He was a committed supporter of the British Empire throughout World War I, though from 1915 the Ulster Protestant was forced to form a national government in coalition with the Catholic Ward, whom he disliked intensely. He emerged from the 1919 elections for the first time with a convincing majority, though he spent most of his time trying to stave off a decline in the prosperity which the farming community had enjoyed during the war. However, the political balance started to shift to the cities with the growth of urbanization, and he only just won the 1922 elections. His marginal majority in Parliament made his last administration overreliant on the particular concerns of individual MPs. He died in office in 1925.